ingenious

PRONUNCIATION:

(in-JEEN-yuhs)

MEANING:

adjective: Clever, creative, inventive.

ETYMOLOGY:

Via French from Latin ingeniosus (clever, talented, full of intellect),
from ingenium (inborn talent), from gignere (to beget). Earliest
documented use: 1483. Don’t confuse ingenious with ingenuous
even though both words are from the same root.

USAGE:

“The mothers and their daughters prove to be brave, resourceful, and
remarkably ingenious at befuddling the goons.”
Marilyn Stasio; Predator and Prey; New York Times Book Review; Apr 20, 2014.

I have noticed that when chickens quit quarreling over their food they
often find that there is enough for all of them I wonder if it might not be
the same with the human race. -Don Marquis, humorist and poet (29 Jul
1878-1937)